pocket-full-of-seaglass

-Le Puy-en-Velay-

This morning started the way any good morning should; sleeping through Mass. I went to bed ready to be blessed and holy, and woke up forty minutes after the blessing and holiness started. Oops. Turns out it’s way harder to wake up at 7.00am when you only fell asleep around 3.00am; who knew? I’d let it slide this time though, on account of the fact that it was for the best reason: I had been overheating. At 13*. Sleeping bag already paying it’s way.

Even so, first stop was the cathedral – after taking a million years to get ready, naturally. All the accounts I’d read talked about slowly making longer and longer days as they got fitter, but mine seemed to be getting shorter. I just wanted to sleep, but the sleep made me feel gross. Eternal dilemma; your problems really do follow you when you travel. But at least I’m constantly exhausted in France, I guess !!

The cathedral is cool and massive an up-itself; everything an all-powerful religion based on Some Guy should be <33 It also had (inside the giant chapel with ornate, ancient designs and this place of oh-so-reverential-worship) a gift shop full of statues of baby Jesus sleeping in a boot (?), postcards of donkeys burning in eternal flame (??), and ‘Blood of Jesus’ scented incense (???). Because if there’s one thing Catholics love more than God, it’s a bit of commercialisation.

Inside the gift shop, they also sell credentials. So I figure I might be a little crazy here, and give being a registered pilgrim a go. Only took me 350 kilometres. A quick scribble on a yellow notepad that asks for my name, address, and email and €5 forked over, and I get my first stamp. 79 to go until my next credential!

I’ve been thinking more about the point of the credentials, given that none of the French gîtes seem to give a toss if you have one, and have come to the conclusion that I don’t really care much about them. Or the Compostela, for that matter. This general thing – even though I still don’t know the specifics of why I’m doing it – is way more about the actual physical achievement it’ll have been for unfit me to walk two thousand odd kilometres than it is about a certificate.

And don’t get me wrong – the Compostela is sick. Latin names? Cool old artwork? Fuck yeah dude. But it’s also religious (shocker that one real blow to the system that the religious pilgrimage route is religious) and ehhhh the distance certificate would be more my speed but again, I’d be missing 350km. Anyway! We’ll see how that changes but I think for now the ‘reward’ is still a swim at Finisterra :]

But I’ve gotten off track – we’re at the cathedral. Or at least, outside of it now. Go look around or something, I’m writing a lame little card and you’re being nosy ❤ There’s loads for you to look at while I scribble; the cool old cross directly across from the bench I’m on, or the view over Le Puy from the edge of the courtyard. Actually, how about this: you wander down and take a right on the stairs, follow them back out into the street and stay on it until you reach the marketplace – I’ll meet you there!

The streets here are twisted cobble; to get to the market you stay straight, only turning once to get down another set of stairs. But you won’t have to worry too much about direction; you’re still half following the red/white stripes of the GR65, and even if you weren’t, you know as you’re approaching it.

Incredibly loud orchestra music and a man laying into it on a mic like it’s karaoke night, opera tunes edition. Men dressed as elves running shops that sell medieval clothing, incredible jewellery stores too full for you to fit into with your pack (fuck!), banners hanging from rafters. The smell of crepes and cheese and olives drift through the air as you wander into the hub of it all, where forty odd market stalls sit under their colourful fabric tents. Boxes of fresh fruit, containers overflowing with berries and new, strange vegetables. A man dips a large wooden spoon into a vat, and pulls out scoops of honey, thick and dripping into jars. Another pours fruit elixirs into flasks like a magician. There’s barely room to walk, but the locals dip and turn like dancers, well rehearsed in their routine.

You didn’t even see me coming! We’re both here now, and I’d love to stay but it’s already 11.00am – we really do have to get a move on. Standing in the bustle with big rucksacks isn’t giving us the best attention. It’s time for the big scary task of the day; braving La Poste.

I think of everything I’d heard of before arriving, La Poste was the most universally hated. Self-checkout machines entirely in French, new ways to write addresses, struggle getting mail posted internationally. Nightmare. But, as it turns out, it’s,,, not too bad? I mean granted, they saw my pack and look of abject terror and immediately took me aside to figure out what I needed, so that helped, but y’know ❤

I had built up a (very) small set of postcards, and wanted to send them to the U.S. No problem. Stamps were easy, €3.30 international flat rate – took them like two seconds (they are efficient as hell). Here’s where it takes a turn I wasn’t expecting; they don’t have international envelopes. I’d have to get them somewhere else. Cool, no worries – could I use a plain envelope instead?

“Bye!”

Okay! A quick google search offered no real answer, nor did my attempts at figuring out if you needed the French address format for sending out of France. I was just broadly confused, and getting into a mundane panic about not much at all. The tabacs around me didn’t sell envelopes (though one sold CBD and shirts of Macron ripping a bong – tempting is too weak a word), and after another thirty minutes I gave up. Next town it was. Gave me longer to collect cool postcards at least :]

Helpfully, the tabacs were right next to the waymarkers – I could start walking. Finally; as I made my way up, the church bells began to toll – it was exactly midday. Today is exciting; you leave the town quickly. Up a hill, turn a corner, up the rest of the hill, turn the other way, right to the top. One last view of the statue of the guy holding up baby Jesus and Le Puy is gone, fallen into the valley below.

Quite abruptly, the scenery changes again. It’s almost,, arid? The dryness of the first few weeks made sense; it was hot, and there was a drought. Here, the same applied, but the lava rock formations that tumbled into gorges seemed to tear the climate apart, the ridge-line separating green trees and small streams from the jagged stones and dead branches.

It’s almost unsettling, but it makes for interesting walking. Each step relied on the trust that the stone you’d pick would not pitch sideways without warning – I had about a 76% rate, I’d say. It still feels fairly isolated, but maybe it’s just the dryness.

Scratch that : it’s definitely the dryness. Being a much older route, the Via Podiensis is far more popular, which brings me to another new thing : other fucking pilgrims exist? I’ve seen eight already today, after an hour. That’s insane. More insane? There’s infrastructure. for them.

I cannot properly explain the feeling of going from ‘you should probably ration your water in case there’s nothing for the next 15km’ to ‘(almost) every single town has cold potable water’. Or ‘there’s a gîte in every direction, at all times, even in the tiny scatterings of houses’. Or ‘every other town has a food stall catering specifically to pilgrims with delicious smelling snacks for a few euros’. What the fuck?

And y’know what trumps them all? Toilets. I have so many pictures of public bathrooms on my phone because I can’t believe how many of them there are. Also pilgrim rest stops? Water, toilets, information, snacks? Am I in heaven?

-La Roche –

After six and a bit kilometres, I find myself in La Roche. [AN : I think. To be honest, dear reader, I’ve completely forgotten where I was, but I know it was between Le Puy and Monbonnet and 6km feels semi-right.] Cool, and old, and French and chockers full of walkers. Monumentally confused, I walk through the throng, out past the coolest water fountain I’ve ever seen (spin a massive wheel and a sad lion spits into your bottle), and into the shade on the outskirts of the town.

It’s pesto time, babey. As I pull out my tomatoes, I’m passed by three pilgrims I saw in the shade earlier.

“Bonjour!” circles thrice.

Then, as I pull out my bread, I’m passed by thirty. Not fucking with you, thirty. It’s my first tour group experience. Singlehandedly, they’re more than I’ve seen the entire last three weeks.

An unspeakable amount of ‘Bonjour’s follow.

A tad shaken, and already dreading the next few weeks (cynic in full control), I ate my lunch. Really hoping it’d thin out as I continued, I read a little, wrote a little. I was trying not to use too much data, for fear of upsetting the SIM card gods again, so the general blogging-to-prove-I’m-alive thing would have to take a hit.

I’m also passed by a French man in the Worlds Tiniest Shorts and absolutely nothing else, but that has nothing to do with anything; I just wanted you to know.

Then, refreshed and full, I carried on. I soon passed the second half of the group, then the first, then a few who were crowded around a woman shaking on the floor. Uh oh ! She had heat exhaustion, and they were calling a taxi to take her back to the accomodation. Attempts at offering water and electrolytes were kindly waved off, and on I went.

It was so pretty, this dry heat. It felt so familiar, but the geographical cracks were slivers here; too many things were off. No matter – the twisting branches were fun enough on their own. After a long, long stretch of walking through tall wheat and across empty roads, you get to this really cool little alleyway made entirely of thistles. You, naturally, are in a short sleeve tshirt. You’re going to have a great time.

But the pathway leads to Montbonnet, so you’ll brave the scratches and spiderwebs, and the one thing that stings you and leaves a big old purple stripe on the inside of your arm, somehow.

-Monbonnet-

If I am once again entirely honest : I don’t remember much. This is a good study of why I started these in the first place – I left it a little too long, waited till the morning. And the things that were so vivid not eight hours ago have disappeared into fog. I don’t remember Montbonnet. I remember what came after, and I remember a man filling a bottle, and I remember deliberating over a campsite, but the rest is gone.

:[

I’m skipping to 4km later, as I wander over the top of a hill overlooking what I incorrectly assume is Saint-Privat-d’Allier. It is not.

-La Chier-

La Chier is small, and old, and French. Not sure if anyone else is recognising the common theme here, but I reiterate. Small, and old, and French. And it still has a fancy rest stop. What the fuck?

I take full advantage of that rest stop – it’s nearing 6.00pm, and I’m starving. I’ve also been out of water since Monbonnet, that much I do remember. Cashews and an apple, some of the cold potable water to wash it down. I feel luxurious – and speaking of luxurious, I’m about to book somewhere to stay for the third night in a row.

It had been more than a week since my spine had last touched a bed, and I was beginning to feel it. Unfortunately, I was most definitely too late to reserve anything online, which meant my only option was showing up or calling. I much preferred just rocking up, but it was late enough that people would start to be busy with dinner and I didn’t want to interrupt – which meant it was time to mangle some French.

I didn’t want to stop at Saint-Privat-d’Allier – I still had a few kilometres left in me yet, and hours till dark. So I turned the page in my guidebook and found a place close to five kilometres from the town. Perfect! Two hours odd walk away. Dreading it with every bone in my body, I dialled the number.

As usual, absolutely nailed the first sentence, then he responded on French and I was f u c k e d. Scrambling, I tried to reiterate that I wanted one bed, no dinner. Eventually he gave up and handed the phone to someone American – who I later learnt was another pilgrim who also couldn’t speak French – to try and get the translation across. It almost worked, but he was expecting me thirty minutes early. Rightio.

My pace was around 3.7km per hour – pushing it to 4.5km shouldn’t be t ha t hard, right? And then I flipped the page back to my current stage. Oh fuck. I’d forgotten about the bit to Saint-Privat-d’Allier. I didn’t have four odd kilometres, I had almost e ig h t. And an hour and a half to make it. Shiiit.

So, I booked it. Speedwalking of the kind you can only find in early Kath & Kim episodes – minus the brightly coloured sportswear – all the way down the hill. At one point, very intelligently, I actually began running. I don’t understand what possessed me to not just ring again and attempt a ‘hey I’ll be a bit late!’, considering there wasn’t even anything he needed to do to prepare for me, but I was tired and not thinking (clearly). So, running downhill on sketchy rocks and jarring both of knees repeatedly, I made it to the first view of town.

-Saint-Privat-d’Allier-

Saint-Privat-d’Allier is fucking gorgeous, set on the side of a mountain directly at sunset, and full of so many gîtes you would not b el i e v e. Every corner rounded provided another three, and almost none of them had signs up that said ‘complet’. Why didn’t I stop, you ask? Why didn’t I ring and say ‘oops sorry my bad I won’t make it’? No clue. Not one. I’d made a rare decision and I had to stick with it, which meant a speedwalk through the town, past shops (I was so hungry and almost out of everything – shops tomorrow it was!) and empty gîtes, up the hill, down a road, up the hill again, all the while with this horrific anxious knot in your stomach. Jesus Christ.

I passed settlement of fake hope after settlement of fake hope. The time was ticking, and my legs were on fire, and I was so going to hate past me the second I stopped walking because I could already feel the ache in my bones. But I could hate me later; right now all that mattered was getting there and finally, after so long I reach it, and surely, after twenty days of the exact same way of ending paragraphs and beginning new ones, you hopefully don’t still believe me because it’s not! Fucking! Pratclaux!

-Rochegude-

Rochegude is small and lovely and Also has many open gîtes – but I go past each and every single one. The sun is officially setting now, all golden and red, so naturally, the light is waning. Where do the arrows lead, you ask? Directly downhill, because why the hell not.

This, lovely lovely reader, is the exact point at which I realise my mistake. Because there’s still a kilometre and a half to Pratclaux, and my little brain has just finished it’s panic-fuelled adrenaline spike and realised I can’t make it in time. But that does not mean I won’t try.

When walking slowly kills you, I can only recommend the pinball strategy. Bracing myself against a tree trunk, I simply angle my body towards the next one that looks strong enough to hold me, make sure I’m on a downward slant and run. Slam into that next tree, repeat. Your arms ache but your legs? Also ache this is such a terrible idea please don’t do this.

Also? I ran out of water like thirty minutes ago, so now I’m tired, thirsty, running down a hill full of rocks and roots and terribly eroded sandy dirt, and it’s almost dark, and just know that any time I describe anything like this, it’s not to say the trails are bad, more that I’m a fucking idiot and the poster child of not listening to my body. Anyway!

-Pratclaux-

Eventually, legs weak, arms heavy, (mum’s spaghetti) I make it to the welcome sign. I stagger down the path a little, sorely regretting not just sleeping on one of the several perfect benches I’ve passed in the last hour and a half. A sign tells me the gîte is to the right – it’s called Ribeyre and I can only read it as ribeye. I stumble into this guy’s backyard, make some sort of phone-call-esque-surfer-dude-wave motion, cobble a terribly formatted sentence together in my brain, sputter out ‘je suis celui sans français’ (‘I am the one without French’), and hope he gets it.

He does. He leads me to another small building, where two women are eating. Here I meet my phonecall saviour, as she laughs and says, “Max is here!”.

I try to return the enthusiasm, but if my knees do not feel hot water in the next two seconds I will implode (can you tell I was feeling dramatic?). I pay him €25 (€20 for the night, €5 for breakfast), take my shoes off and haul my massive pack upstairs, bonking against the stairway as I do.

I get a room to myself tonight – maybe it was worth it! I messily throw my things everywhere in order to get to my towel and have the most satisfying shower of my life. Lukewarm water with zero pressure at all has never felt so good <33

And then I write, as my companions eat below me. I can hear their conversation through the wooden floors, and I listen to them gossip about people I’ve never met as I try to figure out some little things in my brain. Eat, too. Pesto, tomatoes, the last of my bread. I’m running dangerously low, and I’ll need to grab more stuff tomorrow.

It’s technically the next morning, but let’s pretend I met you here last night. I wasn’t expecting 27km when I started, that’s for sure! But for a first day back, I’m happy. Yeah my legs snap when I move them, but right now I’m just going to call that the sound of victory <33

---

Day 20 – September 9th

Le Puy-en-Velay to Pratclaux

27.0km

~ 27.0km total

€31

~ €31 total

(390.7km combined)

(€663.23 combined)